Disney-fied: 'Snow White'

We are all familiar with the Disney's Snow White movie because it was one of the first films Disney had ever created. However, this charming tale was told much differently when it was originally written in 1812. Disney had taken a disturbing story and turned it into a family classic. I say "disturbing" because in this day and age you wouldn't want your little one to read this let alone relate to this.

The Grimm fairy tale version starts off with a queen sewing and she accidentally pricks her finger and blood falls into the snow and she thinks to herself those colors look so good together and then she wishes she had a daughter with those colors. Right off from the start, we can sense what kind of story this will be. Then, the queen gives birth to Snow White and dies. Wow, talk about happy. Later, the king marries another woman, but she was "proud and arrogant," hence why she had a magic mirror that she would ask, "Mirror, mirror on the wall who is the fairest of them all?" The mirror would answer "You, my queen," but then Snow White grew up and the mirror said that snow white is a thousand times fairer than you.

She hires the Huntsman just like in the movie, but instead of her heart she asks for the liver and lungs, which is much more gruesome and you can see why Disney had decided against this notion. The huntsman lets her run away because she was pretty and she asked him nicely. However, the Huntsman thinks that the wild animals will kill her in the woods anyway, but it took off the burden of killing her.

Much like the movie, in the story Snow White agrees to clean, cook and keep the house alive while the dwarfs were at work in order to have a safe place to stay and live.

In the Disney version of the movie, the queen turned out to be a witch and had turned her self into an old beggar woman. In the book, however, she simply uses make-up to make herself look older. Since Disney likes magic they had to make the villain seem more terrifying by having her use magic.

Instead of the queen giving snow white an apple, she pretends to sell wares to Snow White. The deceived Snow White then buys a bodice with lace. In order to help her get the lace bodice on, the queen then enters Snow-White's house and she tightens it so hard and quickly that Snow-white fainted. The dwarfs, however, save her life by cutting the bodice open allowing her to breathe.

The next time the queen uses witchcraft, however, not with an apple but a comb. At first Snow White refuses to let in the disguised queen, but then she does and the poisoned comb then, takes effect. The dwarfs again find her on the floor and pull out the comb and she comes back to life. Finally, comes the red apple. However, the queen had poisoned only one half of the apple. To convince her to take the apple she cuts it in half and Snow-White eats the red half and dies.

The dwarfs put her in a glass coffin and they traded off shifts to watch over her/ mourn for her. However, her body did not decay in any way it looked like she was simply asleep. In the movie, they do not show that it was years after her death when the prince did come.

Finally, the prince comes. The prince convinces the dwarfs for him to take the coffin back to his castle so he can look at her fair face. As it happens the servants who were carrying the coffin stumble and it causes for the piece of apple that Snow white had bitten off to become dislodged in her throat getting her to wake up. Sorry, Disney, there was no true love's kiss in this tale.

Now, the ending is where it gets graphic and as Disney solves problems; the old hag fell down a cliff and a giant boulder smashed her. In the story, however, there is a much more dramatic ending; "Then they put a pair of iron shoes into burning coals. They were brought forth with tongs and placed before the evil queen. She was forced to step into the red-hot shoes and dance until she fell down dead."

Yup. they tortured the queen. But Disney obviously felt this inappropriate for young kids to see. Instead, they had justice served for the evil queen in a different manner.